20. “The Day Of The Beast” (1995)
As the 20th century came to a close, end-of-the-millennium anxieties became more and more apparent in cinema, often materializing in the form of movies about the devil or the Antichrist — see “Stigmata,” “End Of Days,” “The Devil’s Advocate,” et al. But the best of this “Omen”-indebted genre came early with “The Day Of The Beast,” the true masterpiece of bonkers Spanish genre helmer Álex De La Iglesias. A joyously blasphemous genre-hopper, it sees priest Father Angel (Alex Angulo) discovering that the antichrist’s arrival is imminent, at which point he sets out to commit as many sins as possible in order to meet the devil and find out the location of the arrival of its child, so he can kill it. Enlisting the help, sometimes volunteered, sometimes not, of death-metal fan Jose Maria (Santiago Segura) and TV pscyhic Professor Cavan (Armando De Razza), it’s a darkly funny, gore-strewn picture that tricks its way into impressive scope and scale on a tiny budget, like a blend of “Preacher” (which debuted the same year — something was clearly in the water) and Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett’s “Good Omens.” Enormous fun.
19. ”Ravenous” (1999)
The time to rediscover this excellent cannibal western couldn’t be more perfect, what with the recent release of ““Bone Tomahawk.” We implore you to remove any thoughts of the skewed critical response in 1999 and revisit Antonia Bird‘s “Ravenous,” a deliciously diabolical stew of pitch black humor, cannibalism, and American consumption during the pre-Civil War era. Captain Boyd (Guy Pearce) survives an ambush by hiding under the pile of his dead comrades, his lieutenant’s blood streaming directly into his mouth. He manages to capture a whole garrison by himself, and for his faux-valor is awarded a medal and a posting to remote Fort Spenser, cut-off from civilization. Together with a band of misfits (standouts include Jeffrey Jones‘ jolly ol’ Hart and Stephen Spinella‘s Bourbon-doused Knox), he hears a nasty survival story from mysterious drifter Colqhoun (an unforgettable Robert Carlyle), and the plot fervently unravels from there. Before any images appear in “Ravenous,” an Anonymous quote winks at the black comedy in the story with a succinct “Eat me.” But the deeper we get into the story, the comedic tones become just another ingredient for the mad cocktail, spiced with two ferocious central performances, a most succulent score by Michael Nymanand Damon Albarn, and — of course — the monstrous theme of flesh-eating gluttony. A deftly compelling and carnivorous tale, “Ravenous” is another win for female horror direction and a bloody tale that’ll give you the shivers even as you cackle along with it.
18. “Perfect Blue” (1997)
Far removed from the poltergeists in live-action J-horror’s, “Perfect Blue” is an animated tale of terror that curdles the brain as opposed to blood. It’s Satoshi Kon‘s glorious directorial debut, introducing his trademark themes of identity, a kind of techno-exorcism of contemporary Japanese society, and the maddening blur between reality and illusion, which he later expanded on in “Millennium Actress” and “Paprika.” Loosely based on Yoshikazu Takeuchi‘s novel, ‘Blue’ follows the career-path of J-pop singer Mima Kirigoe (Junko Iwao), and her attempt to transition into the acting world, much to the chagrin of her manager, Rumi (Rica Matsumoto), and the creepiest stalker ever drawn, Me-Mania (Masaaki Ōkura). Kon, working in tandem with Sadayuki Murai‘s adaptation and Masahiro Ikumi‘s sinister loopy score, manages to evoke a force of paranoia and fear that paralyzes the viewer before any eyes are gouged. The frightening connotations of what is dubbed, in one particularly destabilizing scene, as “luxurious loneliness,” reverberate throughout “Perfect Blue” in ways that fill one with doubt and dread in a starkly cerebral way. There’s rape, there’s violent murder, and there’s mental delirium stemming from the loss of control, but perhaps most frightening of all in “Perfect Blue” is that somewhere within the blurred lines of dreams, TV shows, and the online world, is real life itself.
17. “Candyman” (1992)
On the surface, there’s nothing that should necessarily set Bernard Rose‘s “Candyman” apart from any other urban-legend, campfire-story horror film, except maybe its provenance as a Clive “Hellraiser” Barker short story (and maybe not even that, depending on how you feel about the “Hellraiser” franchise). But as a result of some sort of weird alchemy, everything that can seem jadingly familiar elsewhere somehow clicks into place here in a taut, intelligent, and very creepy film that also manages to deliver on the visceral gore front. A lot of that is down to a brilliant turn by Tony Todd as the eponymous ghoul — one of the few horror movie villains to seem genuinely, charismatically, and ass-clenchingly otherworldly — and to plotting that feels more coherent than usual, if no less preposterously premised. Virginia Madsen plays Helen, the grad student who summons Candyman and then becomes the victim of his increasingly murderous games, as he repays her lack of faith in his existence by framing her for the grisly deaths of seemingly everyone she meets. Ordinarily, this type of narrative runs out of gas before the end, but if anything “Candyman” gets better as it goes along, culminating in a frightening showdown in Chicago’s notorious Cabrini-Green housing project, and an unusually satisfying yet cyclical ending, set to the strains of a now-classic score from Philip Glass.
16. “Cronos” (1993)
Guillermo del Toro‘s debut directorial feature showcases the man’s love of monsters, insects, clockwork machinery, Ron Perlman, Federico Luppi, vampires, and a deep appreciation for special effects as a key storytelling tool. As such, it’s a perfect introduction to his wonderfully imaginative and inventive breed of cinema, and a genuinely compelling horror film imbued with an atmosphere of romance and mythology. As soon as the prologue in “Cronos” opens up about the 16th century alchemist who discovers the key to eternal life as the Cronos device, we feel like we’re about to watch something underlined by a dark sort of splendor. Centuries later, antique dealer Jesu Gris (Luppi) finds the device and starts to feel its effects once it stings him, namely an unquenchable thirst for blood. A sickly aristocrat called Dieter de la Guardia (Claudio Brook) commissions his nephew Angel (Perlman) to find Gris and obtain the device at all costs. The horror is distilled through visually arresting make-up and VFX (marble skins and the harrowing interiors of the device itself), fervent Catholic symbolism, and jet-black humor coalescing in one puddle of blood in a public bathroom. The ’90s will see del Toro turn up the grossness factor tenfold with his horror follow-up, “Mimic,” but “Cronos” replaces jump-out-of-your-seat scares with a unique, distressingly charming, vampiric embrace that you won’t soon forget.